Franchises, not my cup of tea

The past few weeks I have been researching about franchises for my class.  I have learned that it is not for me.  Maybe you could call me lazy, maybe you could call me a wimp, but the amount of time, commitment, and money it would cost to open a franchise seems overwhelming to me and not worth it.  Obviously, it is very worth it for many people or we would not have over 11,000 Dunkin Donuts locations and 35,000 McDonalds, with another 3,500 Holiday Inn franchise locations.

I also conducted an interview last week with a franchisee for Dunkin Donuts named Nick Apostaleres.  I would like to share some of his insights on franchising that I think are useful to anyone who is looking to start a business, even if it isn't a franchise.

• "You must be hands on and be prepared to work your butt off and pay yourself last."  
• “Make sure you don’t run the business by the numbers; customer satisfaction is the most important.”
• “You have to pick a franchise (or business) that is relevant to people.” 
• "You cannot expect to go into business just to make a lot of money, if that is why you are doing it you will be very disappointed."

As I stated in my last post, this past week was really the last week of my bread business for the $100 challenge.  I made the final loaves of bread on Friday that had been previously ordered.  I wavered back and forth and finally decided to use the remaining ingredients, especially of zucchini and make two final batches of chocolate zucchini bread.  I believe this was a smart decision, I did NOT want to make the bread, as I was totally over it.  However, I knew that by doing it, I could use the majority of the remaining ingredients and make a little bit extra money for the challenge rather than the money I would have paid myself to buy those ingredients to liquidate the company.  As I did so, I used the rest of the zucchini, sugar, cocoa powder, mini chocolate chips, baking soda,and applesauce.  (Earlier I had finished the shortening and honey to make the other breads.)  Essentially the only remaining ingredients were maybe 6 cups of flour, a 1/4 of a bottle of cinnamon and possibly a 1/3 of a gallon of milk.  I made the following post on Facebook to officially close my business:

Thank you for everyone's support of my bread business for my class project. My "business" has closed, but I still have four loaves of chocolate zucchini bread if anyone wants them. They are $4 each. Let me know.
Thank you!! I met the required goal by my class and almost met my personal goal. Thanks again and for those who bought and got to eat it, I hope you enjoyed it!

I sold the last 4 loaves of chocolate zucchini bread all to the same person at church and delivered them to her on Sunday.  With the final loaves of bread sold and my business closed, the profit for my business is $147.81.